5.  The applicant was born in 1958 and lives in Espoo.
6.  In 1992 he became a member of a police rally driving club called Handcuff Team Police Finland ry. In 1997, he was elected Chairman of the club.
7.  In May 1998, the applicant took part in a rally in Belgium with a car he had rented. As he was bringing the car back to Finland, the Customs Authorities took note of the fact that the registration of the car had been changed. They started a criminal inquiry into the matter. On 7 July 1998, the Office of the Prosecutor General (Valtakunnansyyttäjänvirasto, Riksåklagarämbetet) decided that a police investigation should be carried out into whether the applicant had been aware of the change in the registration.
8.  On the same date, the Office of the Prosecutor General decided that a police investigation should also be carried out into whether the applicant had accepted bribes while collecting funds for the rally club. In exchange for the money received, the donor’s sticker appeared on the car. The present application concerns these proceedings.
9.  The police investigation of the bribery case commenced on 7 July 1998 and the applicant was arrested the next day. It appears that the applicant was informed about the suspicion of offences only when arrested. He was suspended from his post in the Police Department of the Ministry of the Interior (sisäasiainministeriön poliisiosasto, inrikesministeriets polisavdelning) from 8 July 1998 until 15 February 2001, that is, for a period of two years and seven months. The Ministry of the Interior withheld half of the applicant’s salary for the periods from 9 July 1998 to 9 August 1998 and from 8 November 1998 to 14 February 2001.
10.  On 4 October 1999 R., a State Prosecutor (valtionsyyttäjä, statsåklagare), preferred charges against the applicant for a bribery violation under Chapter 40, Section 3, of the Penal Code (rikoslaki, strafflagen). Alternatively, the applicant was charged with negligent violation of official duty under Section 11 of the same Chapter. On 18 October 1999 the applicant was notified of the charge. Because he held the position of a referendary to the Council of State (Valtioneuvosto, Statsrådet), the case was to be tried in the Helsinki Court of Appeal (hovioikeus, hovrätten).
11.  Following a plea by the applicant challenging the impartiality of the State Prosecutor, the Court of Appeal held two oral hearings on 19 and 25 November 1999 after which it held, in a decision given on 29 November 1999, that the State Prosecutor was disqualified. The applicant had claimed that the investigation had started after receipt of a letter of denunciation from a police officer, and that the prosecutor had made this letter disappear in order not to have to show it to the defence. The Court of Appeal did not confirm any such action on the part of the prosecutor, but nevertheless held that, due to these issues, the impartiality of the prosecutor might appear to be undermined and he was therefore disqualified.
12.  Subsequently, the applicant’s case was assigned to another State Prosecutor, K. On 2 February 2000 the applicant received from the new prosecutor a document entitled “Revised charge” which was dated 31 January 2000. It stated that the applicant had requested, and the club had subsequently received, contributions totalling 18,000 Finnish marks (FIM: approximately 3,000 euros (EUR)) from a company which had a business relationship with the Ministry of the Interior. The money in question had been intended expressly as financial support for the applicant (the navigator) and another policeman (the driver) in the rally. The prosecutor took the view that successful competing abroad would not have been possible without such financial support and therefore it was to be considered a benefit within the meaning of the Penal Code. There was no information as to how the financial support had affected the applicant’s performance of his duties but this personal benefit had been conducive to weakening confidence in the impartiality of the authority’s activities because the applicant could, due to his position, have influenced the police department’s use of funds and acquisitions, at least for projects for which he had been responsible. During 1996 and 1997 the applicant had held the position of presenting official and in practice had authorised orders or checked the invoices for acquisitions amounting to FIM 52,410 (approximately EUR 10,800) made by a person reporting to the applicant from the company now in issue.
13.  The applicant replied in writing to both the initial and the revised charges, arguing that the contributions were not financial support, a gift or an unlawful benefit but payment for advertising. He submitted, inter alia, that he had sold advertisements and concluded such contracts in the name of the club, which had received the payments and entered them in the books. His superiors had been aware of this. The applicant had not made any IT equipment acquisitions and could not even have influenced acquisitions. None of the facts mentioned in the bill of indictment could have been conducive to weakening confidence in the impartiality of the authority’s activities.
14.  On 27 March 2000 the Court of Appeal held a preparatory hearing. The oral hearing was held from 8 to 10 May and on 15 and 25 May 2000.
15.  On 22 June 2000, after hearing 19 witnesses and examining a significant amount of documentary evidence, the Court of Appeal acquitted the applicant.
16.  The court found that the applicant had accepted a benefit connected to his work but that his possibilities to influence IT spending were too insignificant for his actions to lead to loss of confidence in the impartiality of the authority’s activities from an outsider’s viewpoint. He had not made any decision to acquire IT equipment from the company or in any other way tried to influence the procedure with regard to acquisition from that company. The benefit had been paid to the club, which had allocated it to the applicant and it had been based on advertising and co-operation contracts concluded by the applicant on behalf of the club. In those transactions the applicant had mentioned his job title and office.
17.  As to the conclusions to be drawn, the Court of Appeal noted that the central issues to be decided were whether the financial contributions had been a benefit within the meaning of Chapter 40, Section 3, of the Penal Code, whether the applicant, on the basis of his post, had had the possibility to influence the acquisitions from the company and whether this benefit led to a loss of confidence in the impartiality of the authority’s activities. The court answered the first question in the affirmative. As to the second question, it noted that the applicant’s influence was too insignificant. As to the third question, having regard to his limited influence, the court held that it also had to be answered in the negative. Accordingly, the bribery violation charge had to be dismissed.
18.  As to whether the applicant was guilty of negligent violation of official duty, the Court of Appeal found that confidence may be weakened more easily for the purposes of negligent violation of official duty compared to bribery violation. It concluded that confidence in the applicant as an official, and in the police as an authority, had been weakened within the meaning of Section 15 of the State Civil Servant Act (valtion virkamieslaki, statstjänstemannalagen). However, the court found that the acts were as a whole trivial having regard to their harmful and detrimental effect and other circumstances and therefore it also dismissed the charge for negligent violation of official duty.
19.  The prosecutor appealed. He renewed his claims and took the view that the credibility of the testimonies received was not at issue but that the case turned on the conclusions to be drawn from those testimonies. In his reply to the prosecutor’s appeal the applicant submitted that he did not wish to have an oral hearing if the decision of the Court of Appeal was to be upheld. If, however, the decision was to be amended to his disadvantage, that could not take place without a new oral hearing.
20.  On 3 November 2000 the applicant filed a complaint with the Parliamentary Ombudsman (eduskunnan oikeusasiamies, riksdagens justitieombudsman) which gave a decision on 31 January 2001. The Parliamentary Ombudsman also informed the applicant that he himself could request the Ministry of the Interior to terminate the suspension from office, which he did on 5 February 2001. Following the decision by the Parliamentary Ombudsman recommending that a new decision on the suspension of the applicant be adopted on the basis of the essentially changed circumstances, the Police Department granted a termination petition on 7 February 2001. According to the decision of 9 February 2001 by the Ministry of the Interior, the judgments concerning the applicant had not become final. However, in the decision it was noted that the circumstances had essentially changed since the time of his suspension from office, and that waiting for the final judgments could take a long time. Therefore, the Ministry of the Interior held that it was unreasonable to continue the applicant’s suspension from office after 15 February 2001 and terminated it on that date.
21.  On 13 June 2002, the Supreme Court (korkein oikeus, högsta domstolen), without holding an oral hearing, overturned the lower court’s decision and convicted the applicant of a bribery violation, sentencing him to a fine of EUR 532 and ordering the proceeds of the crime, EUR 3,027.38, forfeit to the State. It noted that on the applicant’s request the company had, via the club, on the basis of advertising and co-operation contracts paid FIM 18,000 to him, who had held a post as senior crime inspector in the Police Department of the Ministry of the Interior. The money had been used to cover costs incurred by the applicant and his rally partner in their police rally activities, carried out chiefly during their spare time. According to the contracts, the company’s sticker was displayed on the car. The Police Department of the Ministry of the Interior had, between 1996 and 1998, acquired at least FIM 200,000 (approximately EUR 40,500) worth of IT equipment from the company. Equipment had also been acquired for persons reporting to the applicant and five invoices for a total of FIM 52,410 from 1996 and 1997, mentioned in the Court of Appeal’s judgment, had either been checked by the applicant or his name had been the reference on the invoice.
22.  The court went on:
“In its judgment the Court of Appeal has given an account of what has become apparent as to the applicant’s position and the related possibilities to influence acquisitions of IT equipment, [the company’s] relevant equipment deliveries, the applicant’s police rally activity and the financial support paid by [the company] and its nature.
In the Supreme Court the questions to be examined concern the legal assessment of the application of criminal law to the applicant’s actions and the possible consequences.
The public prosecutor has taken the view that the applicant is guilty of a bribery violation within the meaning of Chapter 40, Section 3, of the Penal Code or at least of negligent violation of official duty within the meaning of Section 11 of the same Chapter. According to the first-mentioned provision, an official must be convicted, if the act is not punishable as the acceptance or aggravated acceptance of a bribe, of a bribery violation if he demands, receives or accepts a gift or other benefit meant for himself or for another person or demands or accepts a promise or offer to that effect which is conducive to weakening confidence in the impartiality of the authority’s activities. The applicability of the provision on negligent violation of official duty requires that a public official, when acting in his or her office, has through carelessness violated his or her official duty based on the provisions or regulations to be followed in official functions, and the act, when assessed as a whole and taking into consideration its detrimental and harmful effect and the other circumstances connected with the act, is not of a trivial nature. The prosecutor considers that the applicant has breached Section 15 of the State Civil Servant Act. It provides that “[a] public official may not demand, accept or receive financial or other benefit which may weaken confidence in the official or the authority.”
The sum of FIM 18,000 paid by [the company] for the promotional spot on the car of the applicant and his rally partner has been allocated, as noted in the Court of Appeal’s judgment, to the use of the acquirer of the contract, the applicant. From the applicant’s point of view, the essential content of the advertising contracts has been to obtain financial support to cover costs resulting from his leisure activity. This comes down to a benefit within the meaning of Section 15 of the State Civil Servant Act and Chapter 40, Section 3, of the Penal Code. The question of how much of his own assets the applicant has used for his hobby lacks significance in this assessment.
For the act to be a bribery violation, there has to be some sort of a link between the benefit and the official’s service. As the Court of Appeal has also noted, the bribery provisions may also cover benefits received by an official in his or her spare time or benefits meant to be used for such a purpose. It has been clear to the parties to the advertising and co-operation contracts that they have amounted to contributions to the rally activities of policemen, in which the applicant has been engaged. The financial support acquired by the applicant for his hobby from [the company], which has been doing business with his office, is linked in such a way to the applicant’s position as to be sufficient for the purposes of the penal provision concerning a bribery violation. Whether or not the applicant has sent to [the company] written co-operation offers explicitly disclosing his official title or office is not decisive.
The application of the penal provision concerning a bribery violation requires that the benefit received has been conducive to weakening confidence in the impartiality of the authority’s activities. Thus it does not require, as does acceptance of a bribe within the meaning of Chapter 40, Section 1, of the Penal Code, that the official has demanded or received the benefit for an action taken in office, nor that through the benefit [someone] has influenced or tried to influence that action or that the benefit would have been conducive to influencing that action. What is relevant for the purposes of a bribery violation is whether the demanding, receipt or acceptance of the benefit typically has been such that it normally, from an outsider’s viewpoint, weakens confidence in the impartiality of the authority’s activities. By “an authority’s activities” in this context is meant the activities carried out in general in the position in question. What the provision aims to ensure is that an official does not act in a manner conducive to arousing suspicion of the existence of inappropriate motives in the authority’s activities. In the assessment of an activity, regard must be had to the fact that confidence in an authority’s activities may be particularly vulnerable to weakening.
Due to the nature of police activity, the neutrality and impartiality of the police and an individual policeman are required to meet especially high standards. The applicant has held a significant post as a senior crime inspector in the police activity unit of the Police Department of the Ministry of the Interior and as the person responsible for projects, to which position, from an outsider’s viewpoint, is attached an extensive possibility to influence. The fact that the applicant has repeatedly accepted financial support from a company with which his department has had a continuous business relationship, is likely to raise suspicion in outsiders as to the impartiality of the handling of purchases connected with police activity. In the assessment of the case the extent to which the applicant has de facto influenced the coming about or the continuation of the business relationship is not decisive. Having regard to the aforementioned position of the applicant within the Police Department, and the relationship between it and the provider of the benefit, the applicant’s actions have been conducive to weakening confidence in the impartiality of the authority’s activities for the purposes of the penal provision on bribery violation.
The above-mentioned actions by the applicant fulfil the constituent elements of a bribery violation only if it can be judged that he has acted with intent. As the case concerns the receipt of personal financial benefits which are connected with the authority’s activity, the non-existence of regulations on fund-raising for the police associations or the knowledge of the applicant’s superiors of his police rally hobby have no relevance in the assessment of intent. Nor can actions of an official be assessed on the same basis as regards fund-raising of motorsports or clubs. Having regard to the applicant’s position, training and duties, the Supreme Court considers that he must have understood that his acts were conducive to weakening confidence in the impartiality of the authority’s activities.
...
Taking into account the considerations on which the Supreme Court’s decision is based, an oral hearing is not needed.”